Dev Blog 15 - The Innovator: Designing New Ways for Humanity to Thrive

//This Dev Blog was originally posted as an update on the Earth Rising Kickstarter on September 16th, 2021//

The Innovator is the specialist for the Industry sector. They are able to place Start-Up tokens in the centre of the board. These tokens provide support for one person per token, and reduce the Strain created by unsupported people in poverty. Each sustainable practice within Industry’s sector allows the Innovator to place one more token.

This is particularly useful for reducing strain from poverty faster than usual, and offsetting the issues faced from disbanding unsustainable practices before there are alternatives in place.

What is Industry, and why is the Innovator its specialist?

The Industry sector is how our society produces, purchases, or otherwise obtains goods needed to provide to its people to give them a higher quality of life. These range from clothes to cars, plant pots to printers, whatever people may need. However, this sector also deals with what those items are made from, along with what happens to them after they’re discarded.

As society stands, Industry is a core part of how our society functions, and as such is a vital area to address if we wish to reach sustainability.

Our current production methods have created a cycle of planned obsolescence and over-use of unsustainable materials that live in landfills for years and years.

To stop this, we must implement circular production, promote E-waste recycling, and use more pioneer materials, along with creating firmer repercussions for companies that try to monopolise things we depend upon.

As with all sectors, Industry cannot work alone. The network of support created by all six sectors is necessary for change.

The Innovator is the specialist of the Industry sector because we believe that ultimately it is through our own ability to imagine and create new ways of working that will revolutionise entire sectors.

At present we already have alternatives to the unsustainable practices plaguing our world, but we’re certain that around the corner are ideas that will revolutionise sectors in ways we haven’t even thought of yet. The Start-Ups they place represent the idea that even in their infancy, these ideas and practices can increasingly diversify both the wealth and methods of support that our society has.

Thank you to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation for allowing us to use their research for this sector of the game! While unable to partner with us, their research and efforts have been exceptionally useful in understanding the direction our Industry sector needs to progress, and we hope that their work continues to push this incredibly influential and powerful sector in the right direction.

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